Me

 

Me – by Elton John

What a wonderfully surprisingly great read this was.

Although I’ve been a humongous fan of Elton John since 1975 (I was 8 then, I’m 54 now), I’m the type of person who is never very interested in the “Hollywood Backstory/Cover of People Magazine” tidbits of any celebrity.  I prefer to read about and watch the celebrity at work and to learn about their craft. I really don’t care about who they slept with or what happened at Madonna’s after-hours party.  So I wasn’t really in any rush to read this thing. Especially since it came out right around the time as the biopic movie “Rocket Man” (which I loathed) came out.  This was probably because I was afraid that this book would be more of the same.

Maybe it’s because this book is an autobiography, and not something written by some third-rate yellow journalist with an agenda, is what made this read so enjoyable.  Odds are that Elton had help writing this thing, but regardless, it’s a highly interesting and engaging read.  This thing is incredibly professional, well-written, and does extremely well packing a lot of the man’s wild life into a sizable, somewhat concise retrospective.

Elton was roughly 70 years old when this book was released, and he actually divides his entire life in equal portions when he wrote this.  So this isn’t a book where 90% of the pages are devoted to the “glory years” (in Elton’s case, that would be from 1971-1975).  That was one of the many reasons I disliked the ‘Rocket Man’ movie. But I digress.  What justifies such equal page space in his autobiography is that Elton’s life has never ever been boring.  It’s been sad. It’s been wild.  It’s been happy.  It’s been crazy.  But never boring. And we get to read about so much of it.

He walks us through his entire life. We read about how subpar parents can really damage a child and have those effects linger well into adulthood.  One could make the case that this is exactly what happened to Elton, and had he not been so talented at the piano and had a lot of luck, you can’t help but wonder if his life would have been rather sad in addition to being very ordinary. Elton’s worst character trait is his moodiness and volatility.  Most who follow his career know this (author Phillip Norman called such instances “Reg’s Little Moments”). Elton acknowledges such traits and never tries to make excuses.  It’s how he is.  We read, for example, how he decides at the last minute that he won’t attend his induction ceremony at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame for some bizarre reason. However, at the VERY last minute, he decides to go after calming himself down.   Except he changes his mind AGAIN.  This back-and-forth happened FOUR TIMES at this event.  At least the man could get a lot of exercising with all of that walking in and out.

Because his life is so full, there are stories that a fan may remember that aren’t even mentioned here at all. For example, we only read about his role as the Pinball Wizard in the movie “Tommy” in passing, and it’s a measly one sentence.  I would think such an experience would warrant an entire chapter, but there’s simply too much here.  Therefore, such omissions don’t leave the reader feeling cheated.

Then we read about the drugs. And the alcohol. And the drugs. And the bulimia. And the drugs. And the illicit sex (with tons of people; mostly male).  And even more drugs.  Fortunately, he was successful in his time in rehab around 1990, and he seemed to kick all of those vices for good. 

Well, what’s even more fortunate is that Elton’s life remains extremely colorful and interesting. He’s still able to be a highly profiled celebrity, yet by keeping his nose (literally) clean, you get the impression that his focus is much stronger and he mostly seems to have found happiness and contentment in his life.  Of course, it’s never perfect.  His relationship with his parents never improved, so we read about the constant bickering with his moody mother, even when Elton is well into his 60s.  He also had a lot of close friends die tragically.  Who can forget Elton’s role in helping the world heal after the death of Princess Diana?  As much as Elton helped US, we tend to forget that Diana was a dear friend of Elton, and her death hit him hard.

As the book winds down, we read about various health ailments, yet Elton has a very tongue-in-cheek attitude about all of his illnesses. He’s convinced that since he survived decades of alcohol and drug abuse, he can survive anything. And he’s probably right.  He seems to have found the most joy with his husband and two adopted sons, which again, didn’t happen until Elton was in his 60s.  He leaves the reader with positive thoughts at the end of this book.  He basically states that he has absolutely no intention of slowing down and wants to accomplish a lot of seemingly insurmountable tasks now that he’s in his 70s.  This isn’t a man who would is content sitting in a rocking chair and watching old television shows.

And after you read about his tumultuous early years, you can’t help but smile and how the tables turned for him in such a very positive way.